Hull Bought For £10m - 12/06/2007

Paul Duffen, a former chief executive of Catalyst Media and a shareholder in bookmakers SIS, heads a southern-based consortium who have bought chairman Adam Pearson's entire stake in Hull City for a fee believed to be about £10 million. Hull is the largest city in Europe never to have had a top flight football team. The new owners have unveiled a three-year plan to reach the Premiership. One challenge is that the relatively geographically isolated city has never fully recovered its prosperity since the demise of the fishing industry. Moreover, the long record of relatively poor achievement by the Tigers means that some football fans support Manchester United or other top northern teams. Rugby is also popular in the city. A population base alone does not guarantee success, indeed in modern conditions it is success that brings success by attracting supporters from far away.